Facebook parent Meta on Wednesday posted sharply higher earnings for the third quarter, boosted by an increase in advertising revenue and lower expenses after it laid off thousands of workers.
The company based in Menlo Park, California, said that it earned $11.58 billion, or $4.39 per share, in the July-September quarter. That's up from $4.4 billion, or $1.64 per share, a year earlier. Revenue rose 23% to $34.15 billion from $27.71 billion.
Analysts, on average, were expecting earnings of $3.64 per share on revenue of $33.58 billion, according to a poll by FactSet.
Meta, which on Tuesday was sued by 41 states plus the the District of Columbia for harming young people's mental health, said the number of active users on Facebook was 3.05 billion as of Sept. 30, an increase of 3% from a year earlier.
The number of monthly active users on its “family of apps” that include Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger, was 3.96 billion as of the end of the quarter, up 7% from a year earlier. Meta does not break out its user figures for apps other than Facebook.
Total costs and expenses were $20.4 billion, down 7% year-over-year.
Shares rose $12.83, or 4.3%, to $312.36 in after-hours trading after the results came out. The stock had closed down $13.02, or 4.3%, at $299.53.